In today’s highly competitive, omni-channel market, companies are realizing the path to success hinges on their ability to understand consumer behavior. Retailers and manufacturers can unlock significant competitive advantage by leveraging consumer insights to make category decisions and create localized merchandising assortments. The JDA Voice of the Category Manager survey, conducted by JDA Software Group, Inc., reveals findings from nearly 100 professionals responsible for category management and merchandising activity in North America. The report revealed that most companies lack the ability to mine and leverage important customer data, and are therefore failing to meet evolving shopping demands. As such, respondents indicated that their number one investment priority in the next five years is big data and predictive analytics (41 percent), followed by investment in customer-driven data science (37 percent) (tweet this).

“The fact that manufacturers and retailers plan to prioritize investment in big data and predictive analytics over the next five years is a true testament to the transformational impact that the modern shopper is having on these sectors,” said Todd McCourtie, senior director, solution strategy at JDA. “Companies are realizing that the path to success in today’s omni-channel market is to analyze and react to consumers’ preferences and behaviors; ultimately truly understanding how, why, and in which manner they wish to shop. Data-driven technologies can help companies make more informed localized merchandising decisions that, in turn, enhance the shopping experience for the customer and improve the brand’s bottom line.”